June is National Immigrant Heritage Month. Since 2014, the celebration has given people across the United States an opportunity to annually explore their own heritage and celebrate the shared diversity that forms the unique story that is America. Appropriately, a powerful short animated film directed by Sai Selvarajan has been named a Vimeo Staff Pick. Its title Coup d’état Math.
The film is a sobering depiction of four immigrant stories — a fight to be born, a fight to survive, a fight t.o find your place, and the fight to maintain.
Just as each immigrants’ story is unique, so too is each narrative in Coup d’etat Math. Watercolor paintings were created by Amanda Selvarajan with whom he collaborated on the short film Sugarless Tea; longtime friend Olivia Saldivar created the illustrations and wood cuts.
Together, with the help of his colleagues at Dallas-based Lucky, where Selvarajan is an editor, they united four narratives into one including audio with voices from different cultures that provide both distinctiveness and commonalities. Watch below:
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“For filmmakers, Vimeo Staff Pick is an honor on the level of being an official selection at one of the major festivals,” says Sevarajan. “It is incredible to be part of Vimeo’s curated collection of diverse projects, which are seen by people around the world, and even more profound during Immigrant Heritage Month.”
Selvarajan, who immigrated to the US with his family at the age of 9, has developed a body of short film work that speaks to the truth of people that are often misunderstood and underrepresented including Coup d’etat Math.
The result demonstrates that the immigrant experience is not singular; it is connected by a fundamental desire to live without fear or persecution, to rise from poverty, and find a sense of belonging.
Be sure to watch this 8:40 short film.
SOURCE: Lucky
